All posts by John

Marmot Essence Jacket

Another Sleepmonsters Review. Ok lightweight jacket, shame about the hood…

Marmot Essence Jacket
Marmot Essence Jacket

The Essence Jacket is a super lightweight waterproof shell designed for weight critical activities like short adventure races, biking, endurance races and speed climbing. It’s made from Marmot’s new PreCip Plus, their “most advanced” fabric yet, designed for high aerobic sports and situations where breathability is critical.

The theory behind the fabric’s breathability is its “unique” microporous polyurethane barrier that is impregnated with silicon dioxide (sand) particles to create many small consistent holes that allow small water vapour molecules to pass through but not larger liquid ones. This sounds to me like the successful Triple Point Ceramic fabric that Lowe Alpine have used for years, but Marmot have aimed for super low weight and compressibility rather than durability. It certainly ticks the low weight and compressible boxes stuffing easily into a water bottle or cycle jersey pocket and weighing only 280 grams.

The jacket is designed to fit over fleece or soft shell underlayers so is sized slightly larger than normal, but still retains an athletic fit. The shoulders feature an ‘Angel Wing’ design, allowing a full range of motion without the jacket riding up when reaching for climbing holds or stretched out on the road bike. With an adjustable elastic drawcord on the hem it really doesn’t budge when you need to use a bit of body language. Cuffs are non-adjustable but are elasticated with enough stretch to pull up over your elbows if required. A pair of large internal mesh pockets are supposed to be pack friendly but because the mesh is so deep a pack waist belt stops you getting your hand down to any contents at the bottom, though opening up the pockets does add a ventilation option.

The fabric has so far impressed with its waterproofness and the water repellent coating is still working well. However, despite claims and some figures provided to ‘prove’ breathability, real world testing says it gets out of its depth pretty quickly when working a sweat up. Let’s be honest, there are very few waterproof jackets that can cope with the amount of moisture generated when working hard, but the Essence does seem to get rather clammy rather quickly, even when just sauntering along with my dogs. Bear in mind that all jackets of this type, with a polyurethane coating on the inside, will feel damp as moisture vapour condenses on the surface before being passed through the barrier along molecular chains or through pores, only a mesh hanging liner or other inner layer will stop this damp feeling, but will add weight and reduce packability. Swings and roundabout as always.

The weight, fit, and waterproofness (so far) of this jacket are definite positives, unfortunately, the hood is a real let down. The volume adjustment iswoeful and the small tab of velcro on the back of the hood that should allow you to tighten it snug against the head, is pitiful. It doesn’t hold under any force, such as moving your hard in any direction, and the tab is so small anyway that there is minimal adjustment there anyway. Tighten down the drawcords at the front to pull the hood around your face and the back velcro will rip open. Use it in the wind and you are asking for a soaking as it billows up big time. The slightly stiffened peak would be alright if the volume adjustment on the back was better but as it is the peak flops down over your face. With some improvement this could be a good value, featherweight waterproof, but at the moment I wouldn’t want to use it for anything other than emergency use or as a backpacking/travelling jacket.

Let it rain

It’s raining outside, it might finally give me a chance to test the Marmot Essence jacket I have here. So far it’s done ok at keeping the midgies off at our last weekend away in Tarbert in Kintyre. Review to come…

Marmot Ion Windshell

Marmot Ion Windshell
Marmot Ion Windshell

The Ion Windshirt is a featherweight hooded windshell made from Marmot’s own P-170 fabric with Defender DWR. Details are a bit thin on the ground as to what P-170 fabric actually is, but essentially it’s a low denier tightly woven polyester with a highly effective water repellent treatment added to it. It’s very light at 148 grams and easily stashes away into a cycle jersey pocket without noticing.

For convenience it folds into the chest pocket and has a small loop to clip a karabiner, useful for attaching to a pack but might be more practical if it had an elasticated buckled belt so it could be easily carried round the waist.

Out of the bag the water repellency was superb and held up to some heavy rain before eventually wetting out. The nature of the weave meant that moisture spread out over the surface and evaporated quickly once conditions were better. Breathability of the fabric was excellent and was enhanced by the full length quality YKK zip. I used this in the Turas expedition race and was great for keeping off light showers and water splashes when working hard on the rowing stage.

Overall cut is a bit square, but with ‘angel wing’ arms the body stays put when you reach above your head, giving full freedom of movement without exposing your midriff. The cuffs are simply elasticated with no adjustment but with enough stretch to pull them up above the elbow if needed and enough length to pull them down over your hands. Body length was good in our large sample and chest size not overly large, so tending towards a more athletic fit than the more leisure fit that most American outdoor brands favour. There’s no elastic or drawcord on the waist hem which didn’t seem to affect its performance at all – most of the time I had a pack on with a waistbelt which held things in tight enough to stop any draughts.

Unusually for a windproof the hood is actually quite good with a nice close fit and two minimalist elasticated drawcords tightening things down enough at the front to stop the hood billowing up in the wind even on the bike. It doesn’t look pretty but it’s effective and would be ideal when you need a little extra protection from midgies or just a bit more warmth when stopped on a mountain top cairn for a few minutes. When rolled away the hood is only held down by a small poppered flap of fabric which does a pretty poor job of holding the hood down when running and it inevitably bounces its way to the side and becomes a little annoying!

There’s no reflective on the jacket so those looking for a bit more visibility will need to look elsewhere, but with its low weight, great water resistance, impressive breathability and useful hood it’s a very useful top to have in your pack. All in all, for £35 this has to be recommended.

Rab Bergen Pants

Instead of tucking them away in that tab up there on the top right I’m going to start putting my Sleepmonsters.com kit reviews here on the main page for all to see and comment…

First up some Rab Bergen Waterproof Pants

Rab Bergen Pants
Rab Bergen Pants

The Bergen Pants from Rab are an eVent fabric set of waterproof overtrousers. Rab are a company with a deep foundation in extreme mountaineering clothing, only making a move into the ‘lightweight’ world in recent years, so you’d expect some sound bad weather protection from these togs.

eVent is an expanded PTFE membrane fabric, similar to Gore-Tex but claiming improved breathability for the same level of waterproofing. These pants use the three layer version for extra durability but with minimal features they retain a low claimed weight of 340 grams.

The men’s large size was great on me and allowed a good range of adjustment with an elasticated drawcord waist and unusually was long enough for my 33″ inside leg. (Most large size garments just seem to increase the waist size and not the leg!). With an articulated knee design, movement was unrestricted and the pants didn’t catch on whatever legwear I had on underneath, even on the bike. With the addition of an elasticated drawcord on the hems to cinch things in tight, the fit works great on the bike, articulating well, not riding up and not catching in the chainrings. The waist sits high too, so provides a good overlap with a jacket when conditions are rough, and stops the lower back being exposed when bent over on the bike.

3/4 length water ‘resistant’ zips on each leg feature a two way zip making them very easy to get in and out of in a hurry or with crampons or ski boots on. A popper closure at the bottom of the leg means you can simultaneously open the zip at the bottom and the top to create a chimney effect to aid cooling. This combined with the impressive breathability of the fabric makes them very versatile and I have used versions of these for over a year for skiing, running, biking, hiking, standing in the rain placing checkpoints and walking the dogs.

Fit and form are top notch, however, as much as the theory is good and other reports commend them, I have been deeply disappointed with the eVent fabric’s waterproofness. I am on my second set of trousers after the first were returned because they were leaking, but unfortunately the second set have suffered the same problems. This set have only been used for some dog walking duties and a few short bike commutes so certainly are not suffering from being dirty or being overworked with sweat evaporation. They wetted out very quickly particularly on the thighs and rear, and attempts to revitalise this on the first set were short lived and a good 20 minutes of rain on the bike would have them leaking like a sieve. Many other users have reported great things of the fabric so perhaps I have been unlucky but this is the fourth eVent fabric garment that I’ve had problems with leaking, so despite being taken with the theory of the fabric, I’m yet to be convinced of its performance. These pants will continue to be my first choice for skiing when I will value the wind resistance, breathability, fit and durability, however, when it comes to use in the rain I’ll use something that inspires more confidence in the protection it will provide.

The Qua

Just gone midnight and just back in from a superb wee training ride in Calderglen with just the beginnings of a thick frost and a few frightened rabbits for company. The Yeti had been struggling with a stuffed shock and a seized back end so its been in the shop and is now better than ever. It really hadn’t been performing like all the reviews said it should have and I was set to get shot of it, but now it’s on fire. Was out on Saturday with GT and Andy Cathcart and rode our amazing Qua trail, which in all honesty is one of the finest trails on the planet. To our surprise it was in great condition despite a week of rain, I suppose because it is clinging to a cliff so nowhere for the water to pool. Everyone was on form and the vision of GT in front of me swooping in and out of trees will stay with me for a good while. I wish I had a head camera to capture trails like these and the beauty of them being ridden in full flow….Santa, please can I have one?

To the edge

Just back in from a stonker of a bike ride with GT, down in the Clyde Valley. The weather was absolutely stunning – a clear, crisp winter day, but not stupidly cold, in fact at points the sweat was pouring off me. Of course, being the winter*, we were on the cyclocross bikes cutting through the mud and rolling around at a fair lick. GT was on form on the downhills and greasy stuff using some revolutionary tyres with knobs on them, while I struggled with the more traditional John Boy approach of worn smooth hand-me-downs that provided negligible grip at most times. All was swell though and I felt good until things got steep when it was off and running for me. The gem of the day though was a new and totally cheeky trail, probably seldom ridden by anyone other than its closest neighbour, the late great Colin McRae. It really was back of the neck stuff as the singletrack trail took us high above a river, frequently taking us to the edge of 200ft cliffs, with off camber tree roots and wet fallen leaves doing their best to send us to the abyss below. The adrenalin was pumping and the sweat began to pour despite the cold and the fact we were pretty much descending all the time. The narrow bars of the cross bikes at times were handy for squeeing between an overhanging wall on the land-side and trees on the abyss-side, but at times I longed for the reassurance of my mountain bike with suspension, predictable grip and excellent brakes. Still, what doesn’t kill us only makes us want to go back and try again! All that adrenalin and mental focus took its toll soon after when my meager breakfast and feeble fuel reserves finally died and I hit the wall, big time. Such a rare occurrence as I’m normally throwing fluid (Nuun electrolytes of course) and fuel (Clif Bars can’t be beaten) constantly on a ride, but I’d left home without a good feed, or a good stash of trail food, so I was on the edge and I was in bits. GT nursed me back for the final 15 mins and I made it home for an evening of refuellling on anything I could find.

Original Mountain Marathon

Just back from the 2007 OMM, the 40th anniversary event, held down the road in the Lowther Hills, by Drumlanrig Castle, scene of my ACE Race and Wan Dae events last year. In the end I wasn’t competing as my partner had realised it was his birthday party that weekend and fair enough was staying home on the lash. Anyway, feeling bad that my new AR teammates were all competing and were travelling the length of the country to get there I felt compelled to ride down there to see them at the overnight camp.

After parking up at Happendon Services I stupidly got on my bike and the problems began. The headwind was incessant and I was having to work damn hard to make any progress, so stopped briefly in Abington for sustenance before beginning again in the, now driving, rain. Shortly afterwards I got the thing I’d been fearing most, a puncture. Of course I’d left my pump in the car, so although I was able to fix the hole, I couldn’t get any air back in the tyre…

4 miles of walking/jogging later I got a bit of air from a bus garage’s air line, but it only lasted half a mile before I was back to walking. Luckily shortly afterwards I managed to flag down a passing car with bike on the roof, who pulled a pump from the back of the car and soon I was on my way.

Eventually after more than one spell of being barely able to turn the pedals on the flat because of the headwind, I made it into the overnight OMM camp, just as it got dark. Eventually after much to-ing and fro-ing and shouting of names I found Gary and John, then Nick and Warren. They’d had good days on the hill and the weather hadn’t affected them too much, but were now suffering in their mini Supair tents which flapped about in the wind all night keeping sleep to a minimum. Sunday was glorious though and they had a great time on the hills while I ended up helping a friend with the finish line commentary, cheering in the runners over the final kilometre and trying to spout out random info about the few names I recognised. Spent most of the afternoon chatting to Dougie Vipond from the Adventure Show, who were filming for the BBC. Thoroughly nice chap though will see how he is when we meet again as we both line up as soloists in the Strathpuffer 24 hour solo in January. This is the world’s only winter 24 hour mountain bike race and should be pretty epic if it’s anything like the last two years when the weather has been attrocious…

Training has begun in earnest…watch this space for progress reports

Pups

Wow it worked. Ok got to stop being lazy and finally get on top of this blog. These new additions to the family have been taking up any spare time I had…